Free lunch for deliberating New York jurors ends

Syracuse, NY - The days of free lunches for deliberating jurors in New York courts have has come to an end.

The perk is one of the casualties casualty as the state court system tries to find a way to cut $170 million from its budget.

The Wednesday evening Traffic Court session in Syracuse also has been axed and judges across the state have been directed to conclude court sessions at least 30 minutes before each day’s 4:30 p.m. closing time to curtail employee overtime.

Onondaga County Judge Anthony Aloi

“We’ve got to do what we’ve got to do. The money just isn’t there,” Onondaga County Court Judge Anthony Aloi said.

Fifth Judicial District Executive Officer Michael Klein said the court system spent $16,070.72 on meals for jurors across the six-county district in the last fiscal year. He also said he did not know how much could be saved in overtime by shutting courts early and terminating the Wednesday Traffic Court sessions. The district covers Onondaga, Oswego, Jefferson, Lewis, Oneida and Herkimer counties.

The courts’ clerks offices will remain open until the end of the business day to serve lawyers and the public, he said.

State Office of Court Administration spokesman David Bookstaver said he didn’t know how much would be saved statewide by ending the lunches. But he said the court system hopes to save millions of the $37.6 million budgeted statewide for overtime in the current fiscal year.

The court system began layoffs Wednesday, issuing pink slips to 74 employees, Bookstaver said. None was in the local district, Klein said.

Aloi said enforcing a strict shutdown at the end of the day might be the hardest change he’ll have to make. It’s been his practice to let jurors deliberate into the early evening hours when it appears they might reach a verdict, rather than having them return the next day, he said.

But that cannot be done anymore without administrative approval, Aloi said.

The purpose of the shutdown is to eliminate the need to pay overtime to non-judicial court employees and court security officers, Aloi said. If a judge continues court beyond the regular close of business, security officers have to be on hand in court and to staff the metal detectors in the building lobby, he said.

That’s the concern behind pulling the plug on Syracuse City Court’s Wednesday evening Traffic Court session. It was established years ago to accommodate working citizens who couldn’t get to court during regular morning sessions.

A sign on the City Court clerk’s office door states the evening court session had been discontinued effective April 6.

Chief City Court Clerk Lucia Sander said she has no idea how many people that will affect because the court does not keep a separate count of day versus evening cases in Traffic Court. Klein said that’s because the majority of people using the evening court were unscheduled walk-ins.

Curtailing overtime is also the rationale for forcing the judges to stop courtroom activities at least 30 minutes before the end of the business day, Aloi said. That’s to allow court clerks to finish their work and to allow court officers to complete security sweeps of the court buildings by the end of the day without going to overtime, he said.

For jurors, lunches will no longer be provided at taxpayer expense when they are deliberating, Aloi said. The courts have historically provided a free lunch to keep the jury together during deliberations.

The state eliminated mandatory overnight sequestration of jurors years ago, allowing jurors to go home each night and resume deliberations the next day. Aloi said court officials have decided judges now should have jurors break to get their own lunches if deliberations run through midday hours.

Also, state officials are asking trial judges to request fewer people for jury pools to cut down on the $20 million cost of providing jurors for the courts across New York, Aloi said.

Aloi said the judges have been receiving updates almost daily from state court officials on how to curtail spending.

The court system recently terminated the Judicial Hearing Officer (JHO) program that used retired judges to handle extra work in state Supreme Court and Family Court across the state. There also have been cutbacks in the Alternative Dispute Resolution Program and court child-care centers, Bookstaver said.